User Reviews

A controversial and shocking movie? Definitely, and the way some people today profess to be jaded about "The Night Porter" says more about our current culture than about the movie itself. Other persons who experienced the Holocaust first-hand have reacted negatively towards it for its portrayal of a destructive but loving relationship born amidst the Holocaust. Their objections are certainly understandable. There has also been, though, an awful lot of politically-correct garbage and pretentious nonsense written about "The Night Porter," much of which has missed or misinterpreted some of the strongest elements of the movie.

When I first saw "The Night Porter" in the early 1980's, it certainly had the power to shock me and many others, yet at the same time it offered a depth of aesthetic experience well beyond just shock for its own sake. These aesthetic qualities produce a sense of doom and sadness, yet also show beauty and love amidst the hopelessness.

Dirk Bogarde gives a really masterful performance as Max, a former Nazi SS man who bears a huge burden of guilt. After World War II, Max works at the main desk of a gorgeous old hotel in Vienna. Here he re-encounters Lucia, who survived the Nazi concentration camps, where she was a victim of Max's sadism. Bogarde's Max, and Charlotte Rampling as Lucia, do not say a word at first during their unexpected postwar encounter in the hotel, yet their understated expressiveness speaks paragraphs. The most controversial parts of the movie show the sort of sado-masochistic relationship which the two resume soon afterwards. While this relationship is very disturbing, with Max's sometimes cruel nature and the destructiveness of the mutual attraction, there is also a kind of love expressed by the two towards each other. Lucia is certainly a victim, yet she also consciously holds a power over Max. The sado-masochism is not glamourized, and I don't see any suggestion that these two lovers are any sort of role models. Yet they also evoke sympathy.

Throughout the movie, Bogarde is able to show a wide range of thoughts and emotions by just a slight movement of the corner of his mouth, or by the raising of an eyebrow. Rampling shows vulnerability and also the power that she has over Max. She sometimes appears like a sleek, sly cat, and at other times clearly like the victim of the camp horrors. Other actors such as Philippe Leroy, Isa Miranda and Amedeo Amodio also do a nice and sometimes subtle job of expressing the psychic state of their characters. Another character, an Italian who survived awful times, appears like a dog who has been beaten and fears another whipping.

"The Night Porter" can be slow-moving, yet this is punctuated by some very vivid scenes. For me, the most striking one is a flashback to a time during the war when Bert, a Nazi associate of Max, puts on a performance for a group of SS men and women, to the accompaniment of some gorgeous classical music. Not only does the scene seem to have a very sinister quality, but Amodio as Bert expresses an emotional longing which has important repercussions. There is also another very eerie flashback showing a musical, cabaret-style performance by Lucia for her SS captors. Something of the corruption, moral bankruptcy and hopelessness of Nazism is conjured up by this scene.

On the downside, some of the minor characters are portrayed in a caricaturish way, the voice dubbing can be off-putting, and some plot elements towards the end of the movie are at times very silly. Through those failures, though, I think the movie still succeeds aesthetically. Partly this is due to the appealing yet melancholy and ominous musical score by Daniele Paris and others, the disturbing magnetism of Max and Lucia, and the cinematography. Throughout the movie the beautiful, fascinating city of Vienna almost seems a character in itself.

"The Night Porter" is certainly not for everyone. In addition to its portrayal of a very disturbing, unconventional love relationship, it has a few brief scenes of graphic sex, and small bits of the ugliness of the camps. For those who don't mind getting through those parts, its aesthetic qualities can be very rewarding. Be warned though that the movie contains much ugliness along with its beauty. As Lucia says to someone who is trying to use pschoanalytical games to avoid his guilt and shame, "There is no cure."

This is quite dark. If you are seeking material that can be described as "happy" or "light", you will not find it here. I didn't know anyone in this prior to viewing. This deals with Max, the night porter of the title, who has tried to put his past in the SS behind him. One night, he spots a woman, Lucia, and they both recognize each other... she was one of the concentration camp prisoners, and the two had a specific relationship with one another. The plot is captivating. This is deliberately paced, and those who have short attention spans, and/or wish for a lot of developments in a feature are not the intended audience for this. I found the behavior of all of the characters chillingly psychologically accurate, and this definitely takes a long, hard, unflinching and uncompromising look at human nature and the mind, and not everyone is going to like the observations. The acting is excellent. All of the leads disappear into their roles. They are all well-cast, too, talent as well as physical types. I don't know if anything similar to this has truly happened, but I can imagine it, and this does pay respect to the historical events. The editing mixes flashbacks and the present effectively. This has disturbing content, including violence, sexuality that is not graphic and explicit nudity. None of it is gratuitous. The DVD has credits and posters, and while the print starts out looking shabby, it turns out to be perfectly fine. I recommend this to anyone who believes they can handle it, and is mature enough, from reading this review. 7/10

It's easy to dismiss a film like this or Salo or In the Realm of the Senses as garbage. It's too easy, in fact, and not very fair. These films are all very interesting, if you can take them. And, if you can't stand the heat, hey, stay out of the kitchen.

Among the ranks of what I'll call the Artsploitation flick, The Night Porter is rather tame. There are only a couple of hardcore sex scenes, and there are really only two scenes with nudity.

What I like about this film is, first and foremost, the performance by Dirk Bogarde. The subtle guilt and shame he projects is simply amazing. He really builds a three dimensional character, and mostly without dialogue. Other performers are weaker. Charlotte Rampling, his captive, gives a very uneven performance. Sometimes it seems on the money, other times it seems forced, or blank. None of the others are really worth mentioning, except for that one actor's ballet dancing, which is quite remarkable.

Cavani's direction is sensuous. I saw this film for the second time today,

and I had failed to notice before that it was directed by a woman. Unfortunately, that doesn't affect my reading of the film any, but it is interesting. This definitely seemed like a male project. Cavani's direction has a certain grace, a certain elegance. The film contains several scenes that could be called masterpieces in the midst of a lesser work. My favorite in the entire film is the one where Lucia locks herself in the bathroom, breaks a bottle in front of the door, and then allows Max to run in after her. This scene is so marvelously directed, it would work particularly well when seen as a separate entity. The famous nude cabaret song, the one depicted on the Criterion cover, is also exquisite.

Technically, it is perfect. The cinematography is beautiful, as I've mentioned. The musical score is also gorgeous. It's possibly one of the greatest. The biggest failure of the film is definitely its script. The story is very difficult to follow. It's never clear exactly what has happened since the war, and what these former Nazis are doing in Vienna. It's also unclear what exactly the trials are that are always being brought up. And I'm not sure what they are afraid of, what they originally plan to do with Lucia, or anything like that. Or why they can't break into Max's apartment again. A lot of this stuff seems silly. I would have also liked Lucia's character better developed. We get the sense that she accepted Max's advances so quickly so that she could get his protection, which she receives in that biblical dance scene. I want more yet. With Max so well developed, Lucia feels somewhat like an object for the plot.

I rate this a high 7/10.

In some ways this film is still very shocking. Although it is neither violent nor vulgar, the situation is disturbing and violent -actually it's something we DON'T see with our eyes: a psychological violence.

Some years after the end of Second World War, a woman meets in a hotel her jailer during her concentration camp period. He was an SS officer, now he's a night porter. With him she re-starts a relationship made of attraction and sadomasochism.

The film is shocking because it describes an insane situation, led by two insane people. These are the disturbing elements of the film, because spectators don't feel well in seeing that. The atmosphere has something very icy and miserable. I think it's precisely Liliana Cavani's goal: a study of insanity, without self-indulgence.

After 30 years "Night porter" remains a gem. An intelligent movie, full of provocation. Charlotte Rampling and Dirk Bogarde are extraordinary.

The Night Porter is a tough, confrontative but rewarding psychological thriller about two people thrust together under very different circumstances to what it was they were both experiencing the first time they met. In the present day, that is to say 1950's Vienna, they are an extremely wealthy female Countess and a shrewd, brash male boss of a small group of staff that do well to keep a luxurious Austrian hotel running as well as it does. What they once were, however, is a male who was fairly high up in the Nazi pecking order of a concentration camp and one of the many female inmates inhabiting it. In short, the film is a depiction of power play and sadomasochism - but a power play and such wherein both parties seem to enjoy playing both the roles of the dominant and submissive. When they meet much later on, and much deeper into their newfound relationship these years later, they enjoy the dynamic that comes with it: one half of the twosome allows themselves to be chained up and spoon fed under these controlled conditions, whereas the other needs to constantly be aware that their identity and history are both at threat of being exposed in an instant.

Dirk Bogarde plays Maximilian, or "Max" to most around him; the said character in charge of a group of staff at a Vienna hotel in 1957 whose job it is to meet, greet and help new arrivals of an often affluent nature. Max strikes us as a bit of an animal, badgering and ordering his crew around as if with some sort of experience in running a tight ship and getting what he wants. Upstairs, the quarters wherein the live-in staff rest sport pictures hanging from the wall depicting separate images limited exclusively to topless women and two duelling boxers going at it in a ring. This overwhelming presence of sex and aggression apparent in this collection of images will come to define the central pairing we observe play out. This pairing, consisting of Max and one other, is complete with the hotel's latest arrival: a young woman named Lucia Atherton (Rampling), who arrives with what we presume to be her usual entourage but immediately makes us aware of something not quite right when she spies Max behind the front desk and vice-versa as she stands there in the lobby. His nervous behaviour during the immediate thereafter is distinctly different enough to suggest something has truly thrown him, whereas Lucia's experiences of PTSD that evening (as she flashes-back to her time in Wartime Europe) allude to a greater truth.

It is out of these beginnings that the two come together and go through the tryst that they do. It is one built on an enforced power exchange of the past that was initiated by a greater power beyond either of their control as well as the fresh control over the participant, whose role in any work or casual relationship is usually of a dominant nature, the "submissive" participant now has. The pair of them were based at the same Concentration Camp during World War Two, he has a guard; she as an inmate. We observe how he would shoot live rounds at and around Lucia's person where it's inferred many other inmates have already lost their lives. To this extent, it is a game; someone playing out their designated role of aggressor and forcing the other through metaphorical hoops for their own pleasure.

Away from the central tract are Max's peers: a large group of other war criminals hiding out in the Austrian city who meet around large tables in grand drawing rooms when they need to discuss something. They object to her presence, but Max wants her to stick around. Another aside arrives in the form of an odd, homo-erotic tie he has with a man named Bert (Amodio); a dancer who performs near-nude routines in the sanctuary of his own abode in front of him. He too is dissatisfied at Max's presence in his own life when Lucia comes along.

Issue and controversy will always come with a film such as The Night Porter. It's a film dealing with very morbid triggers for sexualised urges, but it's a film distilling all of this through this back story of a prisoner/inmate Stockholm syndrome situation that is initiated in a Concentration Camp. One scene which will kill the film stone dead for those whom do not take to it arrives during an opera; a sequence with both parties present, although away from each other, and peppered with these flashbacks of varying sexualised activity in the camps whilst the tenor's performance acts as a deeply juxtaposed overture to what we're seeing. The point being we're not supposed to know whose flashbacks they are; whose memories are being shown and thus, remain unsure as to whether each of the person's reactions sync up with how much they're enjoying the evening or the fact their head's are being reignited with "pleasurable" instances from the past. In 1995, Katherine Bigelow would direct "Strange Days" wherein there was a scene depicting a rape. Through the certain means therein, rapist and rape victim could be conjoined in their experience and could both systematically share the pain and pleasure, agony and ecstasy of what the other was feeling. It could be argued Italian director Liliana Cavani was using similar ideas of power dynamics and enforced shifting emotions all of twenty years earlier, and in films that did not need fiction technological USP's to do so. The film has upset some, as did Strange Days; I happened to find it a quite engrossing and really rather well made drama.

Even though I was planning to watch something else that Saturday night, I came across BBC2 where "The Night Porter" was on and saw it once again. The first time I saw the movie I was a bit disappointed. I had heard so much about this movie that the film couldn't live up to my high expectations. But some scenes found a place in the back of my mind and stayed there. The second time I saw it I was intrigued more and more and ever since I see it as the classic it should be.

If ever there was a difficult movie, it was "The Night Porter". The pace is slow and the characters are all weird. There aren't many movies where you get a homosexual Nazi wanting to be a ballet dancer and a sadistic Nazi still in love with love with a masochistic girl from the camps. (There's more, but I don't want to spoil the plot.) Only a spark of the plot could have been the subject for lots of raunchy exploitation movies, but "The Night Porter" manages to keep its class. The movies is set years after the war. Some Nazis were fortunate enough not to be caught and got on with their lives. Unfortunately one person has survived the camps as well. She immediately recognizes Max (Dirk Bogarde), her cruel S&M-master, and he (now a night porter in a hotel) recognizes her (Charlotte Rampling) as well. The only problem is that the other living Nazis cannot know she's still alive, or they would assassinate her. The passion between Max and his former slave returns and the Nazis find out about their relationship. Max tries to keep her out of their hands, so madly in love that he wants to die for her. (Again, more information would spoil the movie.)

"The Night Porter" is one of the few movies where S&M-relationships aren't immediately reduced to a bunch of idiots and losers playing around with whips and leather masks. It also dares to show you other Nazis than the Pavlovian dogs you normally get to see. And above all it stars Charlotte Rampling as Lucia. Watch her as she performs the dance of Salomé and gets a present from Max (know your Bible and have an idea of what's to come). Watch her face and her near-skeletonlike body very closefully: that is how you should act disgust. Watch her as she locks herself in the bathroom and tries to hurt Max's foot with some glass. Listen to the music, the perfect addition to this murky movie.

Due to the difficulty of the movie it'll never raise above its status as cult classic and actually that's a shame. Be brave and try it.

A jaw-dropping study on love in the most obscure of circumstances. It's an intense and compelling study of these characters who flow in the most opposite of circles (one a Nazi, the other a Jewish prisoner in the concentration camp he works at) and a love that transcends anything I've imagined experiencing. I've heard the film called dull numerous times and I could see why one would think this, but I thought the haunting silences only made the film more engaging and had my eyes further glued to the screen. The structure of spasmodically switching from scenes in the concentration camp to when the two lovers see each other again in 1957 really helped put the viewer into the mind-set of the two main characters. It jars the mind and keeps us aware of this inordinate love and why these people are so confused and attracted to one another. A truly original technique that I really admired. Liliana Cavani uses angles and wide-shots that create a haunting sense of passion and really made the cinematography rank high among my all time favorites. Dick Bogarde and especially Charlotte Rampling are phenomenal. Their performances are passionate, intense and natural. The film certainly lived up to my expectations.

This was definitely not the kind of film I thought I'd have a somewhat lukewarm reaction to, but here we are. It seemed set up to be a real love it or hate it kind of movie - maybe even like the recent Blonde.

It's considered a controversial movie from its premise alone, which is understandable, as it deals with a very disturbing post-WW2 affair between an SS officer and one of the prisoners at the concentration camp he was stationed at. He forces her into the twisted relationship during the war, and then things are shown to resume in 1957, when the two happen to cross paths.

I was thinking I'd get a little more out of this, considering its reputation, and come away feeling a stronger emotion towards it, be it a negative or positive one. It starts out quite surprising, disturbing, and even intriguing, thanks to it taking a while to build to its main premise.

But once that actual plot starts, it just felt like it lost steam, and anytime it tried to build something up again, it became weirdly melodramatic (and not in a good way).

I did feel the first half was solid, though, with it mostly just faltering in its second half (in finding a conclusion). It looks good throughout at least, and Dirk Bogarde seems like one of those actors who's incapable of giving a bad performance, so he was pretty great here.

Far from awful, and far from an easy watch, yet it was missing something to make it a film I'd call great.

Directed by Liliana Cavani. Starring Dirk Bogarde, Charlotte Rampling, Philippe Leroy, Gabriel Ferzetti, Isa Miranda, Amedeo Amodio, Giuseppe Addobbati, Marino Masé, Nino Bignamini. (R)

More than a decade after the end of the war, Holocaust survivor Rampling visits a hotel where she discovers that the night porter was the SS officer (Bogarde) that tortured and abused her during her time in a concentration camp. But theirs is a twisted and sadomasochistic relationship compelled by Stockholm Syndrome, so it's not justice or revenge she seeks, but rather a chance to pick up where they left off. Deliberately provocative art-trash is too serious-minded to be pure exploitation but too exploitative to take seriously; despite the classic richly somber tones of the visual palette, the filmmakers present libidinous fetishism in gaudy terms for deviant arousal while merely skimming the surface of the deeper psychological issues involved. Those who find eroticism in suffering may discover something to latch onto here, but those looking for a mature examination of difficult subject matter won't be challenged beyond the occasional repellent thought or image, and those who are merely curious will probably just be bored.

39/100

A sleazy sado-masochistic story dealing with a peculiar relationship between an ex- Nazi officer , Max (Dick Bogarde), and a woman , Lucia (Charlotte Rampling) , he used to abuse sexually in concentration camp . Years later, after the war , in 1957 , Max the ex-nazi camp officer , unexpectedly meets his former lover-victim at the Viennese hotel where he works as the night porter . An extraordinary surprise takes place when they have a chance encounter at a hotel where Max works as a concierge . Locking eyes in a crowded lobby , they are immediately sucked back into a dark and deadly past of which neither has ever been able to getaway . After they get reacquainted , the couple must hide from the porter's ex-Nazi friends (Philippe Leroy , Gabriele Ferzetti , Bignanini , Marino Massé) who want the woman dead because they fear she will disclose their past . But Max continues to keep ties and friendships with his fellow Nazi comrades . As it turns out, Lucia is a bored housewife , married to an overworked orchestra conductor . Later on , Max decides to confront his former friends . The Most Controversial Picture of Our Time! . ! What shocked people about ¨Last Tango in Paris¨ was that I showed a couple stripped of all the usual cinematic conventions but Tango is a light-hearted romp compared to ¨The Night Porter¨!

This bizarre movie examines the lives of prior Nazi Max and his former captive Lucia with conspirators slowly closing in on them , focusing on their dangerously twisted love affair that was initiated during the Nazi regime , soon after the two resume their manic and doomed love affair as well as the memories of the heinous life of hers lived in captivity in the concentration camps of the war . It also brings forth a flood of confused emotions , brought about by the strange sexual relations she explored with her captor as the young woman was at the concentration camp . A sado-masochistic voyage , not for the faint-hearted and lots of kinky scenes , including lovemaking on broken glass . Starring duo : Sir Dick Bogarde and Charlotte Rampling are pretty good . They are finely accompanied by a motley group of nice secondaries , mostly Italians , such as : Philippe Leroy , Gabriele Ferzetti , Giuseppe Addobbati , Nino Bignamini , Marino Masé , Piero Vida and Isa Miranda . Being rated ¨R¨ for nudity , violence and profanity.

The motion picture was well directed by Liliana Cavani . Liliana Cavani belongs to a generation of Italian filmmakers from Emilia-Romagna that came into prominence in the 1970s , including Bernardo Bertolucci, Pier Paolo Pasolini and Marco Bellocchio. Liliana had intended to become an archaeologist, a profession she soon abandoned in order to pursue her passion for the moving image . Her films often have historical concerns , in addition to feature films and documentaries , she has also directed opera. Cavani became internationally known after the success of her 1974 feature film ¨Il portiere di notte¨ (The Night Porter) . She is a prestigious writer and director known for ¨The Guest¨ (1971) , ¨Dove siete? Io sono qui¨(1993) , ¨La Pelle¨ with Burt Lancaster , ¨Beyond Good and Evil¨ with Robert Powell , ¨Francesco¨ with Mickey Rourke and ¨Ripley's Game¨ (2002) with John Malkovich . Rating : 6/10 . The flick will appeal to Dick Bogarde and Charlotte Rampling fans.

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"The Night Porter" really isn't as shocking as his reputation suggests,but still there is a good amount of sleaze featured here.I've heard that the main source of inspiration for Liliana Cavani was her interview with a real concentration camp survivor who was forced into a sadistic relationship with one of her captors.Dirk Bogarde is excellent as a Max,a former SS officer!The film is well-made and a little bit disturbing-I'm fairly sure that it influenced an infamous "Ilsa-She Wolf of the SS".Check it out,but be prepared for some rather unpleasant stuff!

I am your average film lover who eagerly seeks out the most transgressive films, and devours the Criterion Collection. I must say though that I put off watching this for a long time because the subject matter and idea of a film that romanticizes Nazism just seemed one step too far, especially as a Jewish person. However, after seeing it come up again and again, I decided to bite the bullet and give it a go.

Yes, this film is brutal and not for the faint at heart. I have a natural interest in transgressive sexuality and consider myself somewhere on that spectrum as well so maybe my opinion is biased, but this film was not at all what I expected. I do not see it to be a "Nazisploitation" film, as it has been labeled, it does not romanticize Nazism. It is a deep psychological profile on bdsm and the dynamics of an abusive D/s relationship.

The crazy thing is the main characters really do come to love each other in their own way, albeit in a destructive, violent way not unlike Heathcliffe and Cathy from Wuthering Heights. It is doomed but boy, when they're together its like being caught in the middle of an erotic storm. Charlotte Rampling and Dirk Bogarde are maybe the best on screen couple I've seen in terms of sexual chemistry. The film really builds up the tension and puts you right in the face of their emotional turmoil. It is effective because outside of their affair, the rest of the world is tight laced, gloomy, and overall feeling the effects of post war depression. It was geniusly done how delicate the whole game between the two is, and the smallest sensory details add a layer of ingenuity and sexuality that is beyond belief.

Dirk Bogarde's performance is brilliant, his anger and sensuality, and everything in between completely raw, like a wild animal that constantly has to play at being human. Charlotte Rampling also had this totally unhinged quality and the two really work off each other's energy to bring together something genuine and not often captured on film.

The Night Porter rocked my world and deeply moved me. It was all at once beautiful, erotic, heartbreaking, romantic, disturbing, and terrible. It is a masterpiece.

This little disturbing film is often deemed responsible for the flood of Italian nazi-exploiters. I would say that this is not entirely fair.

While Cavani's film certainly borders on being exploitative, it does not overstep the line. The Italian nazi-exploiters were clearly mostly modelled on another 1974 flick, the infamous Ilsa, She-Wolf of the S.S. and on the earlier Love Camp 7, the granddaddy of the genre. Still, we find a few motives from the Night Porter in sleazier genre entries, in particular L'Ultima orgia del III Reich borrowed the idea of the tormentor/victim fascination.

This was a controversial film at launch, and it's easy to see why. I certainly don't mind controversial films, and I don't mind films that strive to be controversial. But for the latter category, I want to understand the purpose of the film, and of the controversy the director is aiming for. And while this movie addresses some very important topics, it manages to mix them together in a way that just muddies the already dark waters. Challenging restrictive and even oppressive sexual norms is obviously a worthy struggle. The post-war debate on where to draw the line, on how far down the chain of command to prosecute offenders and war criminals is one of the most important ones we've ever had; it is integral to how we view ourselves as a species. Why conflate the two? Naturally, I'm not saying you can't do it. I'm just asking, rhetorically, why you would want to.

The acting comes up short in a number of scenes, while it is quite good in others. Charlotte Rampling's performance is one of the best things about this movie, even though it also wobbles at certain times.

I very rarely comment on sex scenes, but I'd actually like to praise the ones in this film for being realistic and passionate at the same time. Not very Hollywood, if you know what I mean.

Word-of-mouth from Europe created such hype that American moviegoers salivated for its release in the U.S. "Even more outrageous and erotic" than "Last Tango in Paris" was the verdict I'd heard from my few privileged friends lucky enough to savor its "charms" when they saw it abroad. But when Avco-Embassy finally picked it up for domestic release, it hardly made a ripple. To begin with, this art-house lunacy about a Nazi commander's S&M relationship with a beautiful Jewish prisoner(Charlotte Rampling, the only worthwhile element in a way-overlong two-hours) that is resumed some 30-years-later when they accidentally meet at an elegant party, and resume their affair (get out the jelly jar, whips & chains, broken glass, etc.) was laughed off the press-screening at Embassy. Furthermore, the studio's expectancy of an automatic "X"-rating (a great way to mount a publicity hullaboo in the early 1970s) was dashed when the jolly folks at the MPAA let it slip by with an 'R' rating (sans cuts). And so what were audiences left with? A film of sublime idiocy with each scene of kinky Nazi atrocities attempting to out-do the one before, and leaving audiences in a state of uncontrolled hilarity. The filmed bombed in the U.S., despite the dyspeptic performance by poor Dirk Borgarde, the wretched-excess directorial work of the hideously overrated Liliana Cavani, and the film's only asset, the excellent work of the always fascinating Ms. Rampling, even in meretricious tripe such as this. If you're truly in the mood for films depicting the actrocities of the Third Reich, allow your neglected dog to take this one out in the backyard and bury it, and rent instead Visconti's "The Damned" or--for that matter--any of the "Ilse She-Wolf of the S.S." delicacies. But skip "The Night Porter." Believe me, you'll have more fun at your neighbors' tupperware party.

This film is both disturbing and effective. This film stands out as one of the 70's bleakest contributions. It's very hard to obtain just one feeling towards the film since it has so many layers and creates so many emotions.

The lead a night porter who used to be a Nazi officer in charge of a concentration camp encounters his past when one of his previous captives checks into his hotel. A relationship between captor and captive is then revealed. As a matter of fact in some (sick) way they are very much in love. Whether it's the Stockholm syndrome or something else is never quite revealed but when her fiancé leaves she stays behind and the two of them pick up where they left off.

Of course it can in no way be a idyllic relationship and of course problems occur. The fear that she can be used as a witness spreads among the Nazi underground which he is still very much a part off though he wants to leave and stay in the shadows. The movie is about what the night porter does to protect his love from danger and might I say it's quite poetic.

Fabulous performances from both Dirk Bogarde(my favorite actor of all time) and Charlotte Rampling. The frames are nearly perfect and the film itself was so complicated and well done that the director (Liliana Cavani) should be considered a master.

But lets get back to the emotions this film contains. I just can't makeup my mind how I feel about these two people and their love. One side of it is quite beautiful but the other side is both disgusting and incredibly chilling. Unsettling, haunting, beautiful, chilling, poetic, disgusting and perhaps even romantic are the words I would use to describe this film. It's these mixed responses that makes me love this film so much.

Imagine you live in Germany. Only a decade has passed since the end of WWII. The Cold War is in full swing and your country is separated by east and west. Infrastructure is back to normal but the scars inflicted by the war have only begun to heal. You were an SS officer who used to have a job that was unpleasant, yet in your mind necessary. Now you're a lowly night porter for a swanky hotel in West Berlin.

Thus starts the story of Maximilian Aldorfer (Dirk Bogarde) a man who lurks in the shadows along with a small cabal of surviving Nazis. They quietly meet to conduct "trials" to conceal any inkling of their past before the authorities find out, going so far as to kill possible witnesses. Max's life is unassuming and guilt-ridden; "I want to live like a church mouse" he says. That is until the arrival of Lucia (Charlotte Rampling), a former concentration camp prisoner whom he had a sadomasochistic relationship with and was her pseudo-protector. They recognize each other right away and the question becomes what will they do about it? The movie devolves from its tension inducing premise to a sensationalistic exploitation film. Don't get me wrong its leaps and bounds above Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS (1975) but the intention is artistically the same and the fact that director Liliana Cavani tries to claw for deeper meanings beyond its trashy premise makes the film more manipulative than engrossing. There are references to the book of Mark and John the Baptist, a near naked ballet sequence of Mozart's Die Zauberflote and comparisons between Pelleas and Melisande all of which amount to a bucket of filth. It a film that attempts cultural literacy but makes the fatal mistake of being alienating, unpleasant and ultimately wearisome to watch.

The Night Porter (1974) is not so much a movie as it is a forceful invitation into the minds of two severely damaged people. As the relationship between Max and Lucia turn into a despairing echo of what it used to be we see the extent of Lucia's Stockholm syndrome and the depths of Max's depravity. Yet what is forced upon us is the notion that this sordid love story 1: matters and 2: is tragic in a saccharine Romeo and Juliet kind of way.

There is an uncomfortable, long-running juxtaposition between sadomasochism and Nazis. Perhaps it's because even today we equate Nazism with death, destruction and absolute authority. In some circles it's hard not to get aroused by staring death in the face (especially when it's carrying a whip). But while I'm sure this sexual predilection pre-dates The Night Porter, Salo, or the 120 Days of Sodom (1975) and The Producers (1967) I can't help but feel this kind of treatment makes light of the Nazis and their resoundingly negative contribution to world history. Perhaps instead of dressing up in black leather and swastikas it would be wise to downgrade to a Vichy Greatcoat and Kepi, you know, just in case a friend goes rummaging through your closet.

Ultimately while the premise is intriguing and there are touches of artistic merit, The Night Porter is an insipid, opportunistic treatment of history. It makes menial attempts at making its characters believable and relatable but sequentially removes them from a realm of reality within the films final, grueling half hour. What should have been a movie about history, human frailty or lacking that credible love, became a kinky provocation offering little other than cheap thrills.

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